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Mutti's avatar

Awful. We survived Nixon Bush Boys but it is highly questionable this 75 year old with 8 cats will be able to afford named brand foods in the days to come. Kitties generic brand meow mix and tuna will be the future menu. I would like to serve the Donnie mouse meat on his gold dishes the old RAT

Gregg Barak's avatar

Great to hear from you David. It has been a while. Seems as though we are, you and I, in the same exact space about AI and Trump and so on and so forth as I am writing the same type of analysis in my third and forthcoming book on Trump--Regime Change, Authoritarian Treason, and the Outlaw-in-Chief: President Donald Trump's Struggle to Kill U.S. Democracy & Realign American Global Power. Gregg Barak

Lauren Blair Churchill's avatar

I knew there was a reason I liked all those Bens with the pretty holograms. Too bad I had to spend them!

Sheila's avatar

No kidding!! (Sarcasm!!)

Joan Wiersma's avatar

Thank you David. I love you for being here today. And what a day it IS! I'm very worried about unregulated AI. It could be used for good, but like everything else that's good, there is always some evil lurking somewhere, trying to wreck whatever is good about it. Democrats have to win in order to regulate, b/c that orange asshole never will. Without controls, it will eventually turn this planet into a living Hell. I'll be dead, but I think of my great granddaughter. I want a good life for her.

Marylon Simpson's avatar

Hopefully the bastard and aLL OF his cabinet members will be dragged out and put in jail or hung on the white house lawn for public viewing

Chloe Humbert's avatar

The idea that AI could transform anything the way the internet did seems pretty fanciful anyway. AI can't even make output that doesn't get things wrong something like 54% of the time I think one survey found... It's garbage. And for that they want us to pay higher electricity bills and start up coal plants. For inaccurate sex chats with a computer program. Sad.

Paul Lebow's avatar

Sadly the great FDR dropped the ball, winning the battle against banks but losing the war. He opted for regulatory rather than systemic change. The great economists of the time begged him to change our money system from the one we had then and still have today where all money is created by private banks (Don't believe me? Ask AI). Honest Abe Lincoln reluctantly created the Greenback to save the nation. It was the only time the US government actually created our money. It's no surprise that this extremely popular and impactful form of money was quashed by the banking industry. Despite 'welcoming their hatred', FDR could not bring himself to eliminate the money power and the concept of bank-created money when he had the chance. So yes, cash is king because we, like sheep, have ceded the power to create cash to private banks.

David Feldman's avatar

one day you'll finally be able to explain to me how banks create money.

Paul Lebow's avatar

Hi David -

There is no connection between saver's deposits and the ability of a bank to create a loan. A bank just enters the amount of the loan in your account. Its the way the system is designed to work and is why interest rates impact the money supply: high interest-> less lending -> less money created. Think about it - when was the last time you tried to withdraw from your account and the bank said, "sorry, we lent that out"?

"The process by which banks create money is so simple that the mind is repelled," is from economist John Kenneth Galbraith, in his book, Money: Whence It Came, Where It Went.

Marshall McLuhan: "Only the small secrets need to be protected. The large ones are kept secret by public incredulity,"

Paul Palmer's avatar

Paul: One such large secret is the events of 9/11. The explanations of the gummint for what happened are pure horseshit but Americans can't believe anything like the destruction of the WTC could have happened the way it actually did. So they sail on in their glorious ignorance.

Paul Palmer's avatar

David: Every new arrival here (whether by birth or immigration) increases the need for the money supply by a certain small fraction. We could keep the two in balance by having every new arrival being given a certain amount of new money, the amount to be determined according to the needs of the economy. We would then have no need for banks to create money. This to me makes more sense than the current system which leads ineluctably to giant imbalances that manifest as giant inequality. Debt would be much reduced since the banks would not have gigantic amounts of money to lend out.

Paul Lebow's avatar

Yes - In 2011 Dennis Kucinich and John Conyers submitted a bill, HR2990, to essentially do just that. Money is created by the government and spent into the economy according to the ability of the economy to absorb that new money without inflation, e.g. when population increases.

Paul Palmer's avatar

Paul: No good idea is ever brand spanking new in this old and multifarious world we are born into. Funny that you even know the exact number.

Art N.'s avatar

Hi David, hope you are well!

You might want to check out Ed Zitron on Bluesky, or on his podcast "Better Offline." He talks about how A.I. can never make a profit, or do most of the things that companies are promising. A good place to start would be his recent(ish) four-part "The case against generative A.I." It's basically a summary of what he's covered so far.

P.S. This is not a homework assignment, but I did want to share it with you, just in case you were interested.

JulieB's avatar

David you are so right.. Cash is King but not Patel.

Google TrumpRx.gov an official Federal government website.

Joan Wiersma's avatar

It was a nice surprise to see your substack in my email today David. : ) Thanks for all that you do to help save our democracy. You are a still a Gem. Keep on exposing the trash heap that pollutes us. <3

E Walker's avatar

Thank you Mr. Feldman for your podcasts & this newsletter (which never received before).

I learn so much from your podcasts. Giving solutions to what us "plebians" can do would be well-appreciated.

Daryl's avatar

We are paying $200 million for the pedophile ballroom